CHAPTER EIGHTEEN: BACK TO NATURE

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN: BACK TO NATURE

It’s easy to start leading the “city life” in Charleston, and Isle of Palms is a suburb of Charleston, which has none of the Jewel’s facets. As you may recall from Chapter Seventeen, Isle of Palms Marina offered loud, live, whining, off-key music that penetrated our boat hull until pretty late the night of the July 13. Of course! It was Friday the Thirteenth! We’re lucky that Freddy didn’t make a visit to Slow Motion that night. We couldn’t leave early enough the next morning. We were heading to Georgetown, located at Mile Marker 403 on the Intracoastal Waterway. According to our navigation book, Georgetown is “surrounded by natural beauty.” Yesss. Back to nature at last.

And Georgetown also had the best diesel fuel prices on the Atlantic Coast on July 14, so we bought 365 gallons of diesel and made the dockmaster very, very happy. The marina staff at Georgetown consisted of a grisly old salt and a bunch of newbies, who had been working at the marina for a few weeks. That explains why they tied the bow line so tight that we couldn’t bring the stern into the dock. After 3 requests to loosen the bow line, they got it right, sort of. The Admiral was admirably patient, but he gave me a dressing down on how I had to be more assertive with marina helpers and tell them what to do, not wait for them to screw up. Duly noted. Assertiveness is a trait that I exploited for years as a prosecutor. It should serve me well on the waterways. It’s just a bit hard being assertive, when I myself have about 6 weeks of navigation and docking experience. However, bluffing is another useful talent I developed as a prosecutor. Watch out, the next group of marina personnel!

There is a lot of natural beauty on the way to and from Georgetown, which is located along the Waccamaw River. The ICW north of Georgetown is described as the most beautiful part of the entire waterway. I haven’t seen the entire waterway, but I can personally vouch for the natural beauty along the Waccamaw River. As Art and I explored this area, we were both gobsmacked by the greenness of the cypress trees, which grow in the water, or darn close to it. We must have taken more than 100 cypress tree photos. But don’t worry, we’re sharing “just” 10 or 20 with you. There were so many hues of green in each photo. We didn’t do the real thing justice, but if you tried to do a watercolor of the trees and grasses and plants in this area, you would need about 300 different shades of green. And save a special shade of green for the alligator we came across. There is only one photo for you to see, alas, because we were watching this prehistoric creature chomping down on something very chewy and/or very bony for at least 20 seconds, as we slowly crawled by. The Admiral even pulled a U-ee in the middle of the ICW to go back and try to get more photos, without chasing the gator away. None of our photos shows the powerful jaws at work; trust me, you felt sorry for whatever was in that gator’s mouth.

We were in Georgetown on Saturday night, July 14. We had complained to the Georgetown dockmaster about the noise at the Isle of Palms. He told us that there was a restaurant with live music just above the dock, but he swore that he never hears the music when he is on the part of the dock where we had tied up. Well, he must be deaf. Another night of bad singing, but this time a throbbing bass was thrown in. How can any part of American tolerate such performances as entertainment. Sure, the girlfriends and mothers and fathers have to go to the restaurant to listen to their relatives, but after that – what ever happened to songs with melodies and words that meant something? Uh oh, this is old fogie talk, isn’t it? Still, we had the Beatles, the Stones, the Monkees – I see your point. Every generation is entitled to mediocre music – you get what you deserve – but please, please don’t play it near a marina at night when tired boat people are trying to sleep.

Georgetown was quiet at 6:50 a.m., and the water was like a mirror, when we pulled away from the dock. We couldn’t wait to travel through more natural beauty. And for most of the day, we were not disappointed. Seriously, the Waccamaw River offers up so many photo ops. My camera is still recovering. It certainly lifted our spirits that the temperature was 70 degrees, when we left. This is the lowest temp we have experienced for weeks and weeks. What a burst of energy you can get from a non-humid 70 degree dawn! We knew it was going to be a long day on the ICW, and we knew we would meet a large number of Sunday boaters, all speed crazy and many drunk. But as we left Georgetown, that seemed to be very distant, as we looked forward to The Color Green. We were not disappointed for many miles of trees and grasses. We did not see another gator, but we saw a turtle on a log. And we saw lots of shore birds again, as well as the ubiquitous pelicans. At times it was like we were the only boat on the entire Intracoastal Waterway.

Our reverie was rudely interrupted by the first Sunday jet skiers with rooster tails coming out of the back of the skis. Those of you who have used jet skis. What is the attraction? The speed? We have not seen any jet skiers moving slowly through the water, taking in the natural beauty around them. That would be a weird sight indeed. What we see are jet skiers riding 2 or 3 on a ski, jet skiers standing up, jet skiers kneeling on the ski – all tearing around in big bunches, never alone – crossing each other’s wake again and again and again, flying directly in front of Slow Motion, doing “water wheelies” repeatedly and causing big wakes. It’s seasonal, we hope, and perhaps September will be quiet, once most of the jet skiers are in school again. But right now, if you want a definition of anarchy, watch a squadron of jet skiers flying haphazardly across the Intracoastal Waterway – no rules, no responsibility, no consideration, no concern for safety. You get the point.

Our next marina after bucolic Georgetown was at bustling Myrtle Beach, a beach that is 15 miles long and has over 100 hotels. Can anyone remember Atlantic City in its heyday? We thought we would be away from the action by staying at a marina in the Intracoastal Waterway called Barefoot Marina Resort. This Marina promised a swimming pool, and an Enterprise office nearby, so I could get a car to make my Monday Labcorp visit. I had also called the Barefoot Landing Marina, which is at the exact same mile marker as the Barefoot Marina. The biggest different between the two is that the Landing does not have a pool, but it does have “more than 120 shops” and the House of Blues. That marina is basically a dock along one side of the waterway, with a few boats lined up one behind the other. The Barefoot Marina, where we stayed, offered not only the pool, but some lovely showers – and a restaurant with live music that ended at 7 p.m., per their signs. What is it about marinas and dockside restaurants with live music? They’re no more compatible than Sonny and Cher ever were. And speaking of out of tune, mediocre singers….

The pool – very large, 3 feet deep for the most part, very refreshing, and very, very crowded. There are three high rise condos that feed bodies into this pool, especially on a Sunday. Still, I enjoyed my brief time in one small part of Enorma – pool. And I experienced another random act of kindness. I was sooo thirsty, and I was told that waitpersons from the nearby restaurant took drink orders at the pool. I spotted one and asked for a slushie type drink – she had pina colada, mmm. I asked her how much, and she said $5.50. I had brought $5.00, thinking that no drink would cost more than that. I showed her my $5.00, and she said that would be enough. I don’t know what nerve I’m hitting – did I look pitiful, remind her of her aunt, god forbid her grandmother, or just have a pleasant demeanor? Anyway, that pina colada slushie (no alcohol) was delicious. So I stopped by the restaurant to see what else they had. It was basically a sports bar with lots of TVs and loud music. But I looked at a menu, and it listed clam strips, the Admiral’s favorite dining out dish.

I went back to Slow Motion and told him he could get clam strips at this restaurant, which had all the elements of his personal hell – loud noise, TVs everywhere, and people getting drunk. However, the allure of clam strips got him inside the door. We sat down and received our menus – yikes! Each of our menus had any reference to every clam dish blacked out with a magic marker – freshly blacked out! Holy shellfish, Admiral, what are we going to do? He paused, then yelled over the music that he could have oysters instead. So we stayed and sort of enjoyed our meals (branching out from burgers, I had a French Dip). And lo and behold, at 7 p.m., half the TVs turned to 60 Minutes. I don’t think the volume was up. I don’t think one person was watching (the words were printed on the screen). But this is the first time since entering the South that I have seen a non-Fox TV news show in any public place. All the marinas have had Fox TV, every single one. Not that there’s anything wrong with Fox TV, but everyone can benefit from a little diversity now and then. A steady diet of MSNBC can drive you crazy too. PBS or NPR – it would take longer to be dragged off to the loony bin.

We repaired to Slow Motion from the restaurant, prepared for a quiet evening and a good night’s sleep. But no! For some bizarre reason, the Barefoot Landing Marina started putting on an extravagant fireworks display at about 9 p.m. And it went on forever. We watched, because we were afraid the falling flares could hit Slow Motion. And the fireworks kept going higher and branching out wider and wider. Then the chorus of oohs and aahs from the Enorma-pool and the three huge condos on our side of the ICW kept getting louder. And there was applause, thundering applause to match the thunder of the fireworks displays. You had to be there. No, I did not take any photos. First of all, I was stunned. Secondly, I thought the fireworks would end as I ran to get a camera. Thirdly, I really didn’t want photos of fireworks, no matter how spectacular. Okay, they finally ended with a major Christmas red white and green theme, and by 10 p.m. it was pretty quiet. Plus, the jet skiers were all in bed too. At least there is a time limit on the rental of these abominations, I mean recreational playthings.

We had so much fun the first night at Myrtle Beach that we stayed two nights – no, that wasn’t the reason. We usually plan to stay Sunday and Monday night at the same marina, so I can get my Lab work done on Monday. Myrtle Beach met our needs for a car and a lab – on the trip South, we will surely find another place. That’s not to say we didn’t do some good at the marina at Myrtle Beach. We did a pump out and we filled our fresh water tanks. We also found a WalMart Supercenter. If any of you know the Admiral, you know this is cause for joy – Snoopy-like dancing around in circles joy. I was willing to go in order to look for a dehumidifier for our cabin, which is beginning to, shall we say, smell. We headed to WalMart and an hour later we left with 53 items – not including a dehumidifier – mostly fresh fruit and vegetables, and things like laundry detergent, hangers, and did I mention, potato chips, cheese crackers, Jack Daniels pulled BBQ beef? Tonight we enjoyed the fruits of our WalMart spree – fresh corn on the cob, potato salad, cole slaw, and the aforementioned pulled BBQ beef. It made the mind-numbing, eyes-glazing over, dizzying experience of walking/running up and down dozens of aisles almost – almost – worth it.

Adios, Myrtle Beach – we returned to our boat people ways and headed north today, July 17, to Southport, North Carolina. Another day, another state. This part of the ICW offered its own dangers. Most of this part is called “The Ditch”, and the first part of “The Ditch” was dug out of hard rock. The bottom is still hard rock, and there are hard rocks on the banks, as well as hard rocks in the waterway that are not always visible. It’s one thing to kick up a little silt, it’s yet another to crack a propeller on hard rock. The Admiral had his work cut out for him. He stayed true to the center of the channel, and we avoided all hard rocks. I don’t think I mentioned that the water changed color in the Waccamaw River, from green to “tea”, or brown. This “tea” stains Slow Motion, so we’ll have to take a lemon juice break to get rid of the stain. Fortunately, the water became green again before we reached our destination, so some of the “tea” color is already off.

There we were, minding our own business, remarking on how close we had come to the ocean, noticing that the ocean was turbulent today, cursing the Tuesday jet skiers who were out in regiments, marveling at the development along the banks, with new houses scrunched together on narrow lots – and out of the blue, namely out of the FLASHING BLUE came a  Sheriff’s boat beside us. What? Can you be “pulled over” on a waterway? What exactly is the “shoulder”? Are you supposed to run aground as quickly as possible? Or throw down an anchor in the middle of the waterway? Where is Emily Post when you really need her? What is the etiquette of yielding to a Sheriff’s flashing blue light from their little patrol boat, when you’re trying to keep under control a 20 ton behemoth?

And then it occurred to me that it had to be a mistake. We had dumped the marijuana in Georgetown – just kidding! I asked Art if they meant business, and he said they had just offered to accompany us to the marina, where we were spending the night. I thought, how courteous, a police escort, just like Charlie Sheen, to our destination. North Carolina was looking up to me as the most hospitable of all the southern states. So we made it to the marina with the flashing blue lights escort in about five minutes. And then a very friendly dock helper greeted us. I practiced my new found assertiveness – tie us up with the stern line first! And he went along with whatever I said, although he probably had about 50 years of maritime experience on me. This assertiveness stuff worked great. But I digress – our “friends”, the deputy sheriffs were suddenly approaching Slow Motion, and the head deputy asked if they could board.

Uh oh. Then the next thing the head deputy asked for was all of the boat documents. Double uh oh. And then at least 4, perhaps 5, deputies boarded Slow Motion, filling our salon to the gills. They took Arthur down with a choke hold, pulled my hands behind my back and cuffed me, then asked if there was anyone else on the boat. Shaken, but unbowed, I assertively asked for a copy of a search warrant. One of the deputies stuffed a rag in my mouth. It went downhill from there. They tore apart all the cabins, found my needles and syringes – aha! – and we were convicted on the spot.

Are you buying into this? I’m sorry, I can’t go on casting aspersions on the Sheriff’s Department of Brunswick County, North Carolina. They were all fine gentlemen, who looked at all our boat documents, asked about the syringes, stayed a few minutes to enjoy the air conditioning on the boat, then wished us well on our travels north. They were good guys, not storm troopers. It must have been a slow day in Brunswick County for 4 deputies to be in one little patrol boat, and for them to decide to pull over the slowest boat on the ICW to board and search. I took a couple photos of them and their boat, because, as I told them, this was the most exciting thing to have happened to us all day. And who would believe that we were boarded by law enforcement, if we didn’t have some proof? I told Art it was his scruffy, unshaven face that attracted their attention. He disagreed, but tonight he is clean shaven. That was quite an adrenalin rush – whatever tomorrow brings, we hope it is full of shades of green and devoid of flashing blue lights.